Gary Tomkins captured his second $10,000 win of the year on Sunday night at the Rolling Wheels Raceway Park.
He chased Justin Haers for a long time and it wasn’t until lap 57
when he took the lead at the start-finish line that Gary was able to
take over the event.
Just when it appeared that things were going to be pretty comfortable for him Billy Dunn started to close in.
As laps ticked down and with about five to go Tomkins hit two lapped
cars, Dunn was like a panther ready to strike its crippled victim, but
Tomkins made a quick move and put those two lapped cars between himself
and the eventual runner up.
Afterwards, Tomkins, with a huge smile on his face, looked at his car
as he began to think of the few hours of sleep he was going to get
before heading to work.
He said, “We’ll take it. It was a good car tonight. I just had to wait it out and get past guys when I could.”
Continuing he explained, “I thought I had him twice and the caution came out.”
The key he said, “I had to be patient and work my way past cars. Traffic was brutal and it was tough to pass.”
However, he thinks this is a good launching pad for his team as he
commented, “We just put the new motor in the car last night and it is
the one we are using for Super DIRT Week at Oswego. It was definitely a
real try out for the car. I think we have something good.”
Dunn, who saw the outside work early in the race, said, “I really
think I was a little better between three and four than he was, but that
wasn’t the case in one and two. This wasn’t the best race for the
driver as I made a few mistakes out there tonight. “
Justin Haers, who led for 57 laps, and then simply settled in all by himself in third as the race progressed.
Sitting in his car he said, “Third isn’t bad, but the car did not get tight enough as the race progressed.”
Continuing he thought, “ I really feel we ran well early.”
When he was chasing Tomkins and then Dunn he said, “There is an
advantage sometimes when you are racing by yourself out there. You can
search and try to find the line. I just couldn’t run the bottom.”
The pay days for the Modified drivers was pretty darn good and all
could use the 100 lapper as a stepping stone to the next couple of weeks
as they will be vying at the Fulton Speedway Outlaw 200 and then move
on to Super DIRT Week.